Marching Song of the First Arkansas
An almost identical song, "The Valiant Soldiers," is attributed to Sojourner Truth in post-Civil War editions of her Narrative.
In June the regiment saw action at Mound Plantation, Mississippi, and at Goodrich's Landing, Louisiana, where the unit remained through January 1864.
He received a commission as captain in the First Arkansas Volunteer Infantry Regiment (African Descent) in November 1863.
[7] Captain Miller first mentions the "Marching Song" in a letter from Vicksburg to his mother in Morristown, dated January 20, 1864.
On sick leave at his home, Miller died on June 30, 1864, at age 30, from a fever he had acquired during his service with the First Arkansas.
The broadside had this brief introduction: "The following song was written by Captain Lindley Miller, of the First Arkansas Colored Regiment.
Captain Miller says the 'boys' sing the song on dress parade with an effect which can hardly be described, and he adds that 'while it is not very conservative, it will do to fight with.'
See dar above the centre, where de flag is wavin' bright, We are goin' out of slavery; we are bound for freedom's light; We mean to show Jeff Davis how the Africans can fight, As we go marching on!
Den fall in, colored bredren, you'd better do it soon, Don't you hear the drum a-beating de Yankee Doodle tune?
(Chorus) The black soldiers, in exuberant spirits, brag in the first three stanzas that they will show the rebels they are formidable fighters.
Lincoln is described as "Father Abraham," a title that associates the President with the Old Testament patriarch, emphasizing the religious sanction to the abolition of slavery.
[14] Sparky and Rhonda Rucker included four verses from the "Marching Song" in a medley titled "Glory Hallelujah Suite" on The Blue and the Grey in Black and White, released by Flying Fish Records in 1993.
Bernice Johnson Reagon, Sweet Honey's founder, renamed the song "Sojourner's Battle Hymn.
"[15] Truth's biographers Erlene Stetson and Linda David describe the song as "rousing, brashly defiant, irreverent and joyous," and characterized Sweet Honey's version as "stirringly performed.
Songs of Freedom North and South, with talented local singers and musicians from Battle Creek, Michigan, including a rendition of "The Valiant Soldiers" by Carolyn Ballard.
In the post-Civil War editions of Truth's Narrative, "The Valiant Soldiers" is introduced by this sentence by Francis Titus: "The following song, written for the first Michigan Regiment of colored soldiers, was composed by Sojourner Truth during the war, and was sung by her in Detroit and Washington.
She had become a powerful and popular speaker on such reform topics as abolitionism, women's suffrage and temperance, often including songs in her presentations.
To support herself, Truth sold her carte de visite at lectures in addition to sheets of her favorite songs and copies of her Narrative.
Sometime around Thanksgiving 1863, Truth collected food in Battle Creek and delivered it to the First Michigan Colored Infantry, which was being organized that fall at Camp Ward in Detroit.
"[20] Truth is first linked to the song in 1878, fourteen years after Miller's version was published in the National Anti-Slavery Standard.
Later editions printed in Battle Creek in 1878, 1881, and 1884 have the song inserted on a blank page between the original "Narrative" and the "Book of Life" sections.
[21] Titus's note that the song was composed for the First Michigan Regiment appears to be one more of the minor inaccuracies she introduced into her editions of the Narrative.
[23] But there is no evidence Truth composed the lyrics before Lindley Miller's "Marching Song" was published and widely distributed.
